H2+ suddenly bricked. Help!

[iamhere2]

Hi All!

I bought Odroid H2+ approx. a year ago. Built a hand-made plexiglass case and attached 8Gb of Kingston memory, WiFi USB stick, one NVMe and two full-size SATA disks, fan. This configuration works well for several months under Ubuntu, I used it as NAS and as IoT controller.
Sometimes (quite rarely) I suffered from strange behavior - e.g., after reload Odroid didn't start well for the first time, only from the second restart.

And finally, one unhappy day it just didn't start at all after graceful shutdown.

The current situation:
Nothing is showed on HDMI output.
One blue and one red LEDs turns on immediately after power connected.
Neither reset nor power buttons changes anything.
Long pressing on power button turns it down, but only until I finally unpress the button, so it's not possible to "turn it off" by buttons.
The behavior exactly the same with and without disks and/or memory (any of two memory boards as well as together).
I tried to disconnect backup battery and wait for a long time - noting different.

What can it be? What could go wrong? How do I diagnose it? Are there any chances to restore it?
Do anybody have any ideas/advise?
Thanks.

[mctom]

Hi,

First idea is to try a different power supply, preferably with much higher amps rating. If the problem appears to be slowly progressing, and we assume it's a hardware fault, it is usually related to capacitors - and PSU has got plenty.

[L67GS]

X2, So many times just in the past few months problems just like this were due to a weak power supply. Are you using the HK one?

[InsideJob]

I'd test mem in another system too. I remember first boot with new mem there was no video for an unusually long time. Think it was checking/saving timing info. If not power supply or mem then CPU or BIOS. Maybe mctom can replace those but I'd say you're out of luck in that case.

[iamhere2]

Yes, I use original PSU, delivered with Odroid, this one: https://www.hardkernel.com/shop/15v-4a- ... y-us-plug/
60W, 15V, 4A and it won't be easy to find another with similar parameters...
What would be the minimum and recommended parameters of power supply for H2+?

[mctom]

It doesn't have to be exactly the same. Anything in 14-20V and about 60W rating should be fine. If you test without HDDs, I think 12V could also work, and that one should be more common.

There are no recommended PSU parameters because it largely varies depending on stuff you connect to HC2.
Input voltage is officially specified at 14-20V range.

[iamhere2]

Thank you, I'll try to find something appropriate like "14-20V and about 60W" and test with it.

[mctom]

Probably one of laptop AC adapters would be adequate, if you can find one with a similar plug.

[L67GS]

Could monitor the voltage and see if it drops under load before buying another psu.

[mctom]

That may be flawed with false negatives - short current spikes / voltage drops may not be detected by DMM.

[iamhere2]

Well, I bought universal PSU with a set of connectors, including suitable to my Odroid, with voltage regulation up to 15V, and current up to 5A.
Unfortunately, behavior of my Odroid hasn't changed at all.
After power connection - red LED, after a tiny fraction of second - blue LED, and that's it.
Unfortunately, don't have another memory module yet to test with it. But afraid, that maybe something important on board has broken

[InsideJob]

I remember reading in another thread that the memory slots themselves were particularly fragile on the H2+. Think someone said they were really only good for like 10 removals/insertions. Pity there's no speaker connector for diagnostic beeps, that might have given you another clue. I'd definitely check that there aren't any bent pins though.

[iamhere2]

A couple of users reported they could revive their board by using the USB-SPI flashing tool.
viewtopic.php?f=173&t=43601
viewtopic.php?p=337260#p337260

This is a wiki page for reflashing the BIOS.
https://wiki.odroid.com/odroid-h2/hardw ... programmer

[iamhere2]

A couple of users reported they could revive their board by using the USB-SPI flashing tool.

Thank you! It's promising!
Although that guy below wasn't lucky with the same symptoms:
viewtopic.php?p=327007#p327007

Well, I've ordered CH431A programmer and will try to reflash on my own. At least it's interesting experience.

[iamhere2]

Thank you, everybody!
Like a miracle, it works! I managed to flash BIOS with a CH341A tool (after several attempts) and now my Odroid can enter BIOS and boot OS! Wow!
It was incredibly interesting to resurrect it and thanks to your help I succeed.
I only wonder what could be the reason for sudden BIOS flash data corruption.
Anyway, now I'm armed against such cases!